


Stars Forever

by justbreathe80



Category: Social Network (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, American Football, Boarding School, F/M, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-21
Updated: 2011-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-27 16:48:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbreathe80/pseuds/justbreathe80
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Eduardo,” Coach says.  Eduardo didn’t even know that Coach Sorkin knew his first name.  “You ready?”</p><p>He takes a deep breath.  He can’t ignore how the ball felt in his hand, the way that everything looks and feels completely transformed with the laces between his fingers.  “Yeah, I’m ready, Coach.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stars Forever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ivynights (incantatem)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/incantatem/gifts).



> Written for the 2011 tsnsecretsanta exchange
> 
> WHAT IS THIS FIC EVEN. I decided to take two things I love (The Social Network and football) and mash them together. Liberties taken and much of this story is based on informed but less-than-expert knowledge of football, boarding school life, and Ivy League athletic recruiting. Suspending some disbelief might be in order.
> 
> ivynights, I know that this maybe isn't exactly what you asked for, but I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> Many thanks to altogetherisi for the read through, and many thanks to my darling riverlight for her writing support and beta.

The Saverins pack up and leave São Paulo the summer after Eduardo finishes the second grade. He’s devastated to leave his family behind, his aunts and uncles and all of his cousins, and his school friends too. He cries when his father tells him, and his father simply says, “It’s not worth crying over, Eduardo.”

So, Eduardo goes, with his older sister and his parents, to Miami. He speaks some English, but the first few months and the start of school are so hard. He doesn’t understand half of what was going on around him, can’t follow the conversations of his classmates. He’s lucky to be able to mostly follow what was going on in class, with the help of the ESL teacher.

He's frustrated, though, and driving his father crazy at home. Not that his father’s home much, but when he is, he’s scolding Eduardo for not sitting still, for running through the house, anything he can find to criticize. One day, Eduardo kicks a soccer ball into his father’s heavy cut crystal decanter set, sending the whole tray flying, luckily only chipping one of the tumblers in the process. His father screams at him, and Eduardo spends the rest of the week in his room, except for meals.

It’s his mom’s idea to sign him up for Pop Warner football. American football, which he knows absolutely nothing about. Eduardo has hazy, bright memories of playing soccer and baseball with his cousins in wide, green backyards in Brazil, but he has never even _seen_ a football game before.

“Mãe,” Eduardo groans when his mother tells him, “I don’t even know how to play football.”

“Eduardo,” his mother says gently, pulling him close into a hug. It’s hard to be annoyed when she does that. “One of the other mothers in the neighborhood says her son plays. I think if you don’t get some of your energy out in a productive way, your father is going to kill you.”

So he goes.

And, surprisingly, he _loves_ it.

He’s tall for his age, and strong, and he can run fast, so they have him playing as a mostly as a cornerback and a wide receiver, and some special teams. When he’s out on the field, he feels like everything slows down for him, just enough that he can see what the quarterback is doing, where he’s looking, see the players who are covering him, run the route he needs to run. The guys on the team are great, happy, smiling American boys, and after a while, he starts to feel like maybe Miami might become home to him someday too.

At first, they don’t tell his father - he never gets home until after Eduardo’s home from practice anyway, but once he decides to stick with it, Eduardo’s mom breaks the news.

His father is less than pleased.

Eduardo still doesn’t know what his mother said, but all he got from that point forward were disappointed looks from his father, and reminders that he needed to keep his grades up.

In his second year, his team makes it to the National Pop Warner Playoffs. It’s exhilarating, and Eduardo feels addicted to the feeling of making that perfect catch and running into the end zone.

By eighth grade, he’s a straight A student, playing for the freshman team at the local high school (and taking math there), and trying to convince his parents to send him to St. Thomas Aquinas in Fort Lauderdale for high school. They have the number nine ranked high school football program in the country and a strong college prep program, which will appease his father.

Like it had before, though, just as things are perfect, they go off the rails. In March of that year, Eduardo’s parents sit him down. He doesn’t know why his mother has such a sad look on his face. At first, he’s worried that maybe someone back in Brazil died or something, but that’s not it at all.

“Eduardo, I hope that you’ll understand that we’re only trying to do what’s best for you. We think that the discipline of the boarding school environment will be good for you before you go off to college.” His father pushes the brochure, with a picture on the front of rolling hills and fall foliage and stately brick buildings, across the dining room table. _Kirkland Academy, a coeducational college preparatory school for boarding and day students since 1797_ , it says across the top. Eduardo rests his fingertips against the heavy paper and looks up.

It’s only been five years, but Miami is home to him now. São Paulo has faded into a sweet, sunsoaked memory. His team, his friends at school—everything he didn’t think he’d have when they first came here—they are all in Miami. He’d been to Boston once when his father went on business, but otherwise the landscape on the front of the brochure might as well be a foreign country.

Eduardo’s mom is silent, but she reaches over to fold back the pages of the brochure, to the page with _Athletics_ emblazoned across the top. Eduardo glances down at the picture of a tall, blond football player carrying a ball across the goal line. He reads, “Kirkland Academy has one of the finest independent school athletic programs in the nation.”

In that moment, it’s completely clear to him—he know that he has a decision to make, probably the most important one he’s ever made. He could fight this; he could refuse to go and make them drag him kicking and screaming. Or he could take this opportunity, and trust his ability to make this work for him somehow, the same way he had five years ago.

“It sounds great, Pai,” he says, forcing some enthusiasm into his voice. His mom smiles, and his dad nods emphatically. It’s done.

Eduardo looks back down and flips back to the front page, taking in the bucolic campus, trying to picture himself among the ivy-covered brick.

*****

Eduardo is used to the heat — he’s never lived anywhere with real seasons, but something (maybe the teasing he’d gotten from his football buddies in Miami about going to boarding school up north) had made him believe that New England is cold all the time.

He couldn’t have been more wrong on that front.

Football tryouts start on a brutally hot and humid day in late August—not quite Florida hot and humid, but Massachusetts is giving it its best shot. Eduardo’s already sweating through his practice jersey and he hasn’t even started running yet.

“Excuse me, Coach Sorkin?” Eduardo says tentatively, approaching the only person out on the field not in uniform, but rather in a short-sleeved polo shirt in Kirkland purple, and khaki shorts.

At first, Coach Sorkin didn’t say anything, just looked Eduardo up and down. He tries not to squirm under the glare. “Yes, that’s me. And you are?”

Eduardo clears his throat and sticks out his hand. “Eduardo Saverin, sir. Freshman, from Miami.”

“Hmm,” Coach Sorkin says, taking Eduardo’s hand and shaking it firmly. “So tell me, Mr. Saverin, what position do you play?”

“I’ve played mostly cornerback and wide receiver, sir.”

Another pause, then, “Yes, that seems like the obvious choice. Well, join the rest of the guys out on the field, Saverin.” Then, out of nowhere, Coach Sorkin smiles.

Eduardo wouldn’t have said it was an evil smile, but an hour and a half later, sore in every place imaginable and dripping sweat, he feels like he may have been wrong. Still, it feels great — his club season back at home had wrapped up in the early spring, and he hadn’t realized how much he’s missed being out on the field, the physicality of those pre-season workouts before the real mental work began.

“Coming back tomorrow, then?” Coach Sorkin says as Eduardo jogs past, and Eduardo smiles at him as he wipes the sweat off his brow.

“Definitely, Coach.”

Over the course of the next week, he gets to know some of the other guys. Cameron Winklevoss, senior and three-year starter at quarterback, has a hell of an arm (so does his brother Tyler, for that matter) and seems to zero in on Eduardo on most of the time they’re on the field together. He can’t help the warmth that spreads through him when Cameron finds him on the sidelines after a 50-yard pass into the end zone and claps him on the back. “Nice work, Saverin,” he says, and Eduardo is feeling better about this move already.

By the end of the week, he doesn’t feel like the absence of his Miami friends—his team—aches as much as it once did. These guys are really solid; he eats with them in the dining hall and lives doors away from them in the dorms and Eduardo thinks that maybe, just maybe, this might work out for him after all.

He’s sure of it when tryouts are over at the end of the week, and he’s made the varsity team.

*****

School starts about a week after tryouts are over, and Eduardo gets swept up into the frenetic schedule of boarding school life. His roommate, Chris Hughes, is from North Carolina, crazy smart and quick to smile, and after hearing some of the horror stories from the guys on the football team (one of the sophomores has a roommate who leaves plates of food around for weeks on end, another has a roommate who sleepwalks), he’s pretty sure he won the lottery on that one.

His classes are hard—he never had to put much effort in before, but he relishes it. He’s never been one of those football guys who thinks that academics are a waste of time, or what you need to do to get to the next step in the sport. He’s never been around kids like the students at Kirkland, who all seem to want to learn and are _excited_ about it. So, he works his ass off in class, and works his ass off on the field. He calls home every few days and tells his mother all about football and everything else, and then gives his father assurances when he reminds him of “what’s important, Eduardo, don’t you forget about it.”

The Kirkland team has been near the top of the Eastern Independent School Conference for the last few years, and this year is no exception. They go 5-3 through the end of October, and Eduardo slowly becomes the team’s leading receiver. He feels a connection with Cameron when they go out on the field, like everything narrows down to them and the space between them, and he racks up 950 yards receiving during those first eight games.

The Homecoming game is huge at Kirkland—their modest stadium filled with students and alumni in bright purple. They’re playing Dworkin School, and Kirkland goes up 10-0 in the first quarter.

Then, the unthinkable happens. First, Cameron is sacked with 13:54 left in the second quarter, and he doesn’t get up. And doesn’t get up. Finally, the trainers help him up, Cameron limping and wincing in pain, and off the field, and Tyler stops throwing on the sidelines and gets into the game.

And proceeds to throw four interceptions in the next ten minutes.

“Goddamnit, Winklevoss!” Coach Sorkin screams as Tyler comes off the field, head hanging. It’s clear to everyone with eyes that Tyler knows that things are going to shit. Eduardo has been open each time, running a route and cutting at the last minute to avoid the safety, but for some reason Tyler threw to the one receiver with tight coverage every time. “What the hell is going on out there?”

“I don’t know, Coach, I’m sorry —” Tyler dropped down onto the bench, grabbing a water bottle.

Coach Sorkin doesn’t back down, and crouches down in front of Tyler. “Saverin was wide open on all of those plays! Have you lost your mind?”

Tyler finally looks up, and Eduardo groans. He can tell that his teammates are seeing the same thing he’s seeing by the way everyone has gone as quiet as you can go on the sidelines during a homecoming game. “I don’t have it, Coach. I can’t see it.”

Coach Sorkin is quiet, calm and still, and no one says anything at all. They watch as the clock ticks down on the first half, the defense busting their asses to keep them in it. Then, Coach nods, stands up and claps Tyler on the shoulder. “Okay.”

Eduardo can feel his own eyes widen as Coach Sorkin strides right up to him, purposefully. “Um,” he says, because it’s like they’re in the Twilight Zone—nothing is making any sense at all.

“How’s your arm, Saverin?” he says quietly, and Eduardo is confused. He’s not really sure what he’s asking.

“It’s fine, Coach.”

Coach Sorkin rolls his eyes. “Your throwing arm. How’s your throw?”

Eduardo swallows hard. “I—I don’t know—I’ve never played quarterback.”

“Well, you can’t be worse than what we’ve got, and we all know that at least you know what the hell is going on on the field.” Coach turns to Eduardo’s gathered teammates. “Olsen! Get over here and take some throws from Eduardo. We may need a miracle in the second half.”

Billy jogs over, a shocked look on his face, too, and tosses the ball to Eduardo, who catches it firmly. His heart is pounding, threatening to jackhammer its way right out of his chest. He almost hopes that he can’t throw for shit, because he’s not sure he could go out on the field and not puke. They walk over to an empty area next to the field, and Eduardo fits his fingers into the seams of the ball, spaced evenly, feeling the stretch of his hand.

He takes a deep breath, looking at Billy and thinking about the trajectory of the ball, how far away Billy is, the angle and the force. Then he lets it go.

The ball spirals cleanly through the air, and Billy doesn’t have to take a step in any direction to catch it in his hands.

“Again?” Billy calls across the space between them, and Eduardo tries his best not to look at the huge smile on Billy’s face, not to feel the curious, anticipatory eyes from the sidelines of the field on them. He nods and Billy tosses it back.

They do it five more times, Billy moving back and forth, until Eduardo makes a perfect throw almost seventy yards. Then, he feels Coach Sorkin’s hand on his shoulder. It’s halftime; the teams have already headed back to the locker rooms, and the fans are flooding out to the concession stand.

“Eduardo,” Coach says. Eduardo didn’t even know that Coach Sorkin knew his first name. “You ready?”

He takes a deep breath. He can’t ignore how the ball felt in his hand, the way that everything looks and feels completely transformed with the laces between his fingers. “Yeah, I’m ready, Coach.”

Eduardo goes in at halftime, calls plays and makes four drives into the end zone, rushing one in himself. The final score is 28-10, and Eduardo has never felt this way after a football game in his entire life. Everything around him looks different, and his arm is tired, yes, but he can’t wait to do it again.

Coach Sorkin makes him the starting quarterback at the beginning of his sophomore year, after the Winklevosses have graduated and gone off to Harvard.

Everything about football changes for him, in that moment. He starts to see this as more than a hobby, but something that maybe, just maybe, he’s good at. More than good, even. _Gifted_ , he overhears Coach Sorkin say to one of the assistant coaches about him. He knows his father wants him to follow in his footsteps, become a businessman and do everything that’s expected of him, but suddenly, this whole new world his open to him. The idea of playing college football becomes not just a nice idea, a pipe dream, but a reality.

Sophomore year, Kirkland runs up a 9-2 record before getting booted in the second round of the EISC playoffs. Eduardo passes for 3900 yards over those 11 games, and is named an All-Conference player. He has many conversations with Coach Sorkin about how to navigate the recruiting process, about D2 and D3 programs that have strong academics and excellent reputations, and makes a plan for attending a camp the summer after junior year to increase his chances of being recruited. Then, he passes for more than 400 and rushes for more than a 100 each of five consecutive games his junior season. That gets him his first D1 coach visiting him after a game. From _Harvard_.

There’s a part of him that doesn’t really believe that he can make this happen—that he can do what his father expects and have football too, but now the Ivy League is recruiting him. Over the next few weeks, he has informal meetings with Penn, Dartmouth, and Brown. Stanford even sends him a letter, although Eduardo is pretty sure he can’t hang in the Pac-12.

It’s crazy, and maybe even a little stupid, but maybe, maybe he can have all of it.

*****

He spends two weeks of July at a football camp at Yale, and it’s a welcome respite from what had become an awful summer at home. He fights with his father every single day, about how football is distracting him, about how it’s time to get serious, to _grow up_. To stop playing games. He’s convinced that his dad isn’t even going to let him go to the camp, and he comes up with a lie, to tell his dad that he’s going to take a class, anything. But his father lets up just before he’s scheduled to leave. Eduardo can’t get out of there fast enough.

It doesn’t seem to matter that his report card was flawless—every night in and out of season spent up way past when he long since should have turned out his desk light, Chris groaning at him to “go to bed already, Jesus, Eduardo”—and he’s signed up for every AP class Kirkland will let him take for his senior year. His advisor and Coach Sorkin had actually met with him before he left for the summer, to discuss whether or not he really wanted to take on the six AP load he’d registered for. He assured them that he absolutely did.

He loves school and he loves his courses at Kirkland, the rigor and the culture of debate and discussion in the classroom. He wouldn’t be happy dropping down a level or taking four academic courses like some of the other guys on the team, just getting by. Eduardo doesn’t want to sail through—furthermore, he _can’t_. Harvard has always been his dream—the only time what he wanted and what his father wanted seemed to be the same thing. And he has to make sure he gets there, even if football can’t take him.

Football is just the icing on the cake—really tasty, amazing icing, but icing nonetheless.

He’s also decided that he’s going to enjoy this year—while his academic schedule is brutal, he feels like he needs to get everything out of Kirkland that he can, academically and socially, before he leaves.

He’s dated some over the past three years. It’s not all that hard to find people who are interested, honestly. He had a girlfriend, a senior named Amy from California, for most of sophomore year, who was smart as hell and now at Stanford, but it had fizzled out before she graduated. Amy had wanted more attention than Eduardo had left over to give.

Divya happens during the fall of junior year, which catches Eduardo somewhat by surprise. Divya is the team’s senior feature running back, and Eduardo had always liked him—the way he was quick to poke fun, to laugh, to anger. After practice one day, Eduardo finds himself alone in the locker room with Divya, who appears to be showered and dressed and ready to go, but still hangs back.

“Hey, Narendra, can I help you with something?” Eduardo says, laughing.

Divya’s loitering around the end of the long, wooden bench where Eduardo is seated, his hands stuffed in his pockets. When he looks up at Eduardo, he’s not smiling.

“Um, is everything okay?” Eduardo says, concerned, because this isn’t an expression he’s ever seen on Divya’s face. He’s usually laughing at something or someone, or yelling. This is altogether different.

Then, Divya’s pulling his hands out of his pockets and moving toward Eduardo, moving his head side to side like he’s scanning the room. “Tell me if you don’t want this, okay?” he says, voice lower than Eduardo’s ever heard it.

“Don’t want what?” Eduardo says, completely confused, but before he can get an answer out, he gets Divya leaning over him, and Divya’s warm lips pressed to his.

Oh. _Oh._

It’s like something he didn’t even know was there lights up inside of him, a light bulb, a flame that he isn’t sure he’ll ever be able to put out, because he honestly had no idea at all. No idea that this was something he ever wanted—something that could feel like _this_. It’s so completely different from the way it felt to press Amy into the mattress of his dorm bed those few times they could sneak some time alone.

So he does the only thing that makes sense, and uses the lapels of Divya’s jacket to haul himself up off of the bench, pressing their bodies together. He pushes his tongue against Divya’s lips, wanting more, _now_ , and feels the heat pool at the base of his spine at Divya’s groan and push back, the close heat of his body.

When they finally separate, both out of breath, Divya smiles. “I guess that’s a yes then, huh?”

Eduardo laughs, hauls Divya a little closer so that their lips are almost touching. “Hell, yes.”

Neither of them is particularly interested in coming out to anyone else, so they keep it quiet. Chris knows (after catching them together in Eduardo’s bed—Eduardo had thought Chris would be out late with his boyfriend), but Eduardo trusts him, and bears the brunt of Chris’ eye rolls and under-his-breath comments about closeted jocks for the rest of the semester.

When Divya gets into Dartmouth, an unseasonably warm late March afternoon, they meet under the bleachers, sharing lingering kisses and pressing each other into the cold metal until Divya finally pushes him away, gently. “This has been a great year,” he starts, and Eduardo isn’t stupid. He’s very far from stupid, and he knows exactly where this is going.

“But?” he says, slinging his arm around Divya’s waist, tugging him in closer.

“I want things to be different in college, Eduardo. I want to be myself, and I don’t think I can do that if I’m still hanging on to this. To Kirkland.”

Eduardo nods, because he’s not ashamed of himself. He has grown to both accept himself, and to accept the way it needs to be if he’s going to ride this football thing to the next level. And if he’s going to keep his father on his side as long as he can. He can’t expect Divya to stay in the closet for him.

He cares about Divya. He _likes_ him, but he’s not stupid enough to think that they are some great romance. It’s been fun, and he’ll miss him.

“Hey, no worries, okay? I had a great time this year.”

Divya smiles. “Me too.”

*****

When he arrives on campus for pre-season his senior year, he’s dating Christy Lee, president of the Student Government Association and captain of the varsity women’s lacrosse team. The truth is, she sort of ambushed him at an off-campus party in April, crowding him up against the wall and saying, “Eduardo. You and me, what do you think?”

He’d had three beers in twenty minutes, and he wasn’t capable of thinking much at all. So he’d just nodded, drunkenly mesmerized by the curve of her mouth, and that had been that.

To be honest, he’s still technically with her because he hasn’t had the time to break up with her, with two-a-days and college applications and talking to coaches taking up nearly every minute. She called him forty times and texted sixty three the week before Eduardo came back to school—so much that he had to turn off his phone because his father was giving him dirty looks about how much it was ringing.

He really needs to make time for it though. He’s pretty sure Christy might actually be insane, if the phone calls and borderline stalking are any indication.

He’s taking AP Calc BC, AP Econ, AP Spanish, AP Lit, AP Chem, and AP Comp Sci. As each syllabus piles up in his bag, he’s starting to regret that decision somewhat, but if there’s anything he knows about himself, it’s that he can work through almost anything.

Two weeks into the semester, though, he gets back his first comp sci exam, and the 24 on the top doesn’t even really register for a minute. There has to be some mistake. Maybe it’s not out of 100?

After class, Eduardo hangs back, approaching Mr. Fincher’s desk tentatively.

“So, I’m assuming you’re here to drop my class, Mr. Saverin?” Mr. Fincher says, hands clasped in front of him on the wooden desk.

“What? No! I don’t want to drop the class.” Eduardo tries not to be offended. He knows that Fincher has no reason to know that Eduardo isn’t really the type to give up, but it will take more than one 24. He knows that no one at Kirkland expects Eduardo to work all that hard—they just assume that the star quarterback will always take the easy way out, and there are plenty of faculty who are willing to help him do that.

“Okay...then what can I help you with?”

“Well,” Eduardo says, scuffing the toes of his black dress shoes against the floor, “I was hoping I might be able to get some extra help.”

Mr. Fincher looks at him skeptically, then sighs. “Help, huh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you know Mark Zuckerberg?”

“Yes, he, uh, he lives in my dorm.”

“Well, Mr. Zuckerberg owes me a favor, so I’ll call it in for you. I’ll ask him to meet you at study hall in Carlson tomorrow night.”

Eduardo nods. “Thank you so much, Mr. Fincher. I promise my next test will be much better.”

Mr. Fincher rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “Get out of my classroom, Mr. Saverin.” Then, “And make sure you beat Cabot on Friday night.”

*****

Eduardo can remember the exact moment when he first laid eyes on Mark Zuckerberg. Mark had transferred to Kirkland at the beginning of their junior year, and Eduardo was sitting in Mr. Saunders’ AP U.S. History class when a curly-headed guy in a navy blue hoodie, jeans, and flip flops shuffled into classroom and sat down in the empty seat behind Eduardo.

“Hey, man,” Eduardo said, turning around and sticking out his hand, “you’re new, right?”

“That’s quite the observation,” the guy said, tone flat, but cutting.

Eduardo laughed—he wasn’t sure what else to do. He pulled his hand back when he realized that his gesture wasn’t going to be reciprocated. “Thanks, I do my best. My name’s Eduardo.”

The guy didn’t say anything, but finally, he sighed and said, “Mark Zuckerberg.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Mark Zuckerberg. Welcome to Kirkland.”

And although they’ve taken virtually every class together from that point forward, they’ve barely spoken more than those few words to each other. Mark slouches his way through Kirkland, sitting in the backs of classrooms, chewing on his hoodie strings and sometimes deigning the class with his (brilliant) answers to questions, which are always delivered covered in a healthy layer of sarcasm.

Eduardo, on the other hand, sits in the front of each class, taking notes, raising his hand, and trying to soak in everything.

Mark is a computer genius—rumor is that what got him into Kirkland in the first place as a junior. Rumor also has it that Mark got shipped off to boarding school after nearly hacking into a Department of Defense mainframe and getting the FBI on his doorstep. Mark started The Facebook, which most Kirkland students use religiously—an online sort of whiteboard for your dorm room door. It had expanded onto other prep school campuses too.

Eduardo is popular, which sometimes still surprises him, a football player, and chair of the Kirkland investment club.

They live in completely different worlds, even on a small campus, and yet, Eduardo has never really been able to stop himself from searching out where Mark is when he walks into any room. He’s been intrigued by him—by the way he held himself back from Eduardo like no one else ever did—since that first day. Mark’s mocking comments to teachers and snide remarks to classmates make him _laugh_.

And now, he’s waiting for Mark to meet him in the Carlson lounge, where they both live, to try to figure out how to understand computer science, if that’s even possible.

Mr. Fincher had told Eduardo to meet Mark at seven. It’s seven fifteen, and Eduardo’s about to start working on his English homework when Mark drops into the chair opposite Eduardo.

“You’re late,” Eduardo says, closing his copy of The Great Gatsby (he’s already read this one before, so he doesn’t bother to mark the page).

“Are you going to turn into a pumpkin?”

“Not as far as I know. How about you?” Eduardo grins, and can’t help but be satisfied by the pinched look on Mark’s face. Like he wasn’t expecting that comeback at all.

“Are you ready or what?” Mark says sharply, tapping on the surface of the table with a pen he pulled out of his pocket. He doesn’t even have any books with him or anything; Eduardo’s not feeling particularly encouraged.

But then, Mark pulls Eduardo’s textbook between them and starts to talk a mile a minute. Eduardo blinks and struggles to keep up, but when he finally adjusts to Mark’s pace, he realizes that what Mark is saying actually makes _sense_.

“Wait, wait,” Eduardo sputters, pulling out his notebook and not missing Mark’s over-exaggerated eye roll. “Just let me—”

“Am I going too fast for the star quarterback?” Mark asks.

Eduardo returns the eye roll, because he’s so tired of that stupid stereotype. Anyone who knows anything about the game knows that you have to be smart to play football, especially if you play the quarterback position. Eduardo memorizes a huge play book every August before the season starts, and he’s responsible for seeing everything on the field and calling the plays. Even the guys on defense, or the offensive line, have to know exactly where to go and what to do at all times. The idea that football players aren’t smart is just, well—stupid. While some of the guys on the field aren’t much more than football smart, Eduardo is. He’s at Kirkland because he rocked his SSATs, and he’s never gotten anything lower than an A in his life.

Well, until now, that is.

“That’s a new one,” Eduardo grumbles, scribbling away on his paper, trying to get down everything Mark’s saying.

Mark lets out a noise that almost sounds like a huff. “I’m not the one who failed their first AP Comp Sci exam.”

Eduardo puts his pen down, and looks up at Mark’s blank face. “Listen, what you’re saying makes sense—I haven’t understood a word that Fincher has said yet, so if you could please just keep going, I would really appreciate it.”

Mark is still, long enough that Eduardo’s convinced that this is a terrible idea, yet again, but then he breaks. “Okay, just try to keep up.”

The hour goes quickly, and they agree to meet again the following week. Mark doesn’t actually seem that annoyed about it. Eduardo turns in the problem set that Mark helps him with, and he gets a 96.

After a couple more sessions, even what Fincher says in class starts to come together for him, and he feels like he’s well on his way to erasing the damage that 24 has done.

About three weeks into their tutoring sessions, Mark asks Eduardo meet him after dinner, in an empty classroom in the science building. Eduardo isn’t sure why Mark wants to meet there but he goes anyway. When he arrives, Mark’s got his laptop hooked up to the A/V system in the classroom, and an open window with a blinking cursor open on the large screen at the front of the room.

“What’s this?” Eduardo says, approaching Mark at the front of the room.

The corner of Mark’s mouth is turned up and his teeth are pressed against his lower lip, like he’s fighting a smile. Eduardo’s eyes are drawn to the curve of his lips, then drift up to the cut of his cheekbones. His face feels hot, all of a sudden.

Well, _shit_. He hadn’t really seen that one coming.

“It’s a test. Well, more a test of my teaching skills than of your programming ability, but I want you to build a program, and I want to watch. I figured this way I could at least be comfortable and not leaning over you while you do it.”

“I’m not sure, Mark—” He’s been getting As in the class, but that’s not this—programming from scratch, in front of _Mark_.

“You know, for someone who’s such a football hotshot, you don’t have a lot of confidence.” Mark folds his arms across his chest and stares Eduardo down.

It’s not how he means to react, but Eduardo’s laughing before he can stop himself. “Okay, first, I have plenty of confidence. Second, think about how you would feel if you had to play football in front of me, and third, did you just say hotshot?”

“Shut up,” Mark says, “and get started, hotshot.”

Mark sits in the front row and sprawls his legs out underneath the desk, telling Eduardo what he wants him to do. Eduardo puts his fingers on the keys, closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, then starts.

He doesn’t know exactly how much time passes—everything reduces down to Mark’s cool, calm voice giving him instructions, to the sound of Eduardo’s fingers on the keyboard, the way he _knows_ this despite his own reservations.

And when Mark is finally quiet and Eduardo finishes typing the last line, he looks up. Mark isn’t even trying not to smile anymore. He’s actually grinning at Eduardo, no longer lounging in the seat, but sitting straight up and leaning forward, clasping his hands on the desk in front of him. Eduardo flexes his fingers and looks down at his watch. They’ve been here for more than an hour. Wow.

“Come on, don’t chicken out on me now,” Mark calls out to him.

“What?”

“Don’t you want to see what you just did? It was pretty great, if I do say so myself.”

Eduardo moves his finger over the mouse pad and pauses over the button that will turn the lines of code he just typed into something real and tangible, splayed across the screen for Mark to see. “Come on, you saw the code, what does it matter?”

Then, Mark’s pushing himself out of his chair and walking over to press himself close to Eduardo (who feels a little lightheaded—he can’t tell if it’s from the non-stop coding or the proximity). He knows exactly where the feeling is coming from when Mark’s hand curls around his on the mouse. “Because,” Mark says, his breath hot against Eduardo’s ear, and it takes everything he’s got not to _shiver_ , “coding isn’t about the code. It’s about creating something, it’s about how you can turn what seems like nothing into something. You did this, and now you should see what you made.”

Mark’s finger is pressing down on Eduardo’s, but in the end, Eduardo’s the one who clicks it. He stands there, watching what he made—what _they_ made—and soaks in the heat of Mark’s body, pressed against him.

*****

While it seems that Mark has always been at Kirkland, they’ve been in different orbits for the last year, but now, they’ve taken to seeking each other out.

It happens the first time when Mark takes the open seat next to Eduardo’s in AP Lit, pulling out his textbooks and sighing. Eduardo knows that this is the course Mark has the least use for, if his biting remarks to Ms. Delpy are any indication.

“Hey,” Eduardo says softly, leaning over to tug on Mark’s sleeve. “You sure it won’t hurt your rep to sit next to me?”

Mark glances over. “Sometimes, it’s amazing that you can function with all of that stupidity.”

“Whatever, you know you love me.”

“Ugh, you wish.”

Eduardo would believe it’s just a fluke, but then it happens in Econ, and in Spanish, until Eduardo’s spending most of his courses trying not to laugh out loud as Mark keeps up a written commentary about the teachers and their classmates, leaning across to scrawl, in his terrible handwriting, on the margins of Eduardo’s meticulous notes.

So, he takes a chance one day at lunch (which has absolutely nothing to do with how much he enjoys looking at Mark’s mouth lately) and plops his tray down next to Mark in the dining hall.

“You know, I’m not technically required to be tutoring you all day.” Mark stares at him, carefully taking a bite of his turkey sandwich before he sits it back down on his plate.

“I’m just here to eat my lunch, Mark,” Eduardo says, grinning and picking up his own turkey sandwich, because prickly Mark is never less than entertaining. “Do you want me to move?”

Mark rolls his eyes. “No, I just wouldn’t want any of your football buddies to see you sitting with me.”

“Mark,” Eduardo drops his own sandwich carelessly onto his plate, “I couldn’t care less about what anyone thinks about me or who I choose to be friends with. Have I ever given you the impression that I do?”

At that, Mark takes a moment, seems like he’s really thinking, instead of just firing off the first thing that comes into his mind. “No, you haven’t.”

“So. Relax. I know that it would be shocking to anyone who has ever met you, but I actually enjoy your company.”

Mark doesn’t seem to know what to say. Eduardo smiles down at the uneaten half of his sandwich. This is the first time he’s ever caught Mark completely off-guard and shut him up, and it feels good.

“Well, I—” Mark starts, then clears his throat. “You’re not so bad either, most of the time.”

And Eduardo knows that the grin on his face is just _ridiculous_ , but it’s getting harder and harder to control himself around Mark, and harder and harder to care about that control.

Mark smiles, just a little bit at the corner of his mouth, before turning his attention back to his lunch.

The lunchtime thing becomes a pattern, and after a while, it becomes a foursome—Dustin, Mark’s old roommate, and Chris join them most days. Eduardo hadn’t really realized, so focused on football and coursework for the last three years, that he’s never really had friends like this.

*****

Eduardo’s been able to start to figure himself out since he arrived at Kirkland. Getting away from Miami and his father has given him the space he needed to grow into the person he is, to start to figure out what makes him happy and how he can balance that with the expectations of his family. Sometimes, he tries to imagine what his life would have been like had he stayed in Miami, and he finds that it’s hard to imagine at all. Kirkland wasn’t what he wanted, but it ended up being exactly what he needed.

And ever since his relationship with Divya, Eduardo has been comfortable with his sexuality. Sure, it’s not like he’s joined the GSA on campus or told really anyone at all, but he’s not ashamed of it. In part, he wants to see this football thing through, because the closer college gets, the more the idea that football isn’t just a hobby, but that it could be his _life_ , takes hold. He knows that no NFL team has ever drafted an openly gay player before. He doesn’t want to cut himself off from the dream before he even has a chance to realize it, so he’ll wait if he has to.

It isn’t like he doesn’t find girls attractive, or that he doesn’t like Christy, per se, but he knows that it’s not something he wants to take any further than they’ve gone. They haven’t had sex (Eduardo lost his virginity to Divya in a New Hampshire hotel room after an away game—it was a bit awkward and amazing and all in all a positive experience), but they’ve fooled around when they could find the opportunity. The problem is, Eduardo’s not sure he even likes Christy that much. Sure, she’s smart as hell and beautiful and _fierce_ , all qualities that he finds attractive.

It may be the fact that Christy is crazy. Not just kooky, but full-on, probably clinically insane. She’s clingy (hell, stalker might be a better term) and overwhelming and she kind of scares him sometimes.

Eduardo needs to break up with her.

So, even though he knows it’s going to be ugly, and that he may be on the receiving end of the crazy for a while longer, he calls her and asks to meet her, on a Saturday afternoon after another win (this time, not even really a contest—54-7). He hopes the adrenaline will help him push through the conversation.

After all, he’s a pretty self-aware guy, and he knows that his attention is already elsewhere.

*****

The Kirkland Pioneers are undefeated going into the last game of the season, against rivals Eliot School. Eliot is the only other undefeated team in the EISC, and Eduardo knows that it’s going to be their toughest game of the season by far. Eliot always gives them a good game.

He also knows that the Harvard coach is planning to be there (as well as some other coaches, but they hardly matter anymore, honestly) and he knows that he has to perform. At the end of October, he submitted his test scores, transcript, and extracurriculars to the coach for review, and he’s hoping that his likely letter might come after this game.

Eduardo doesn’t get nervous before games—nerves are only for those who aren’t prepared—but he finds himself a little bit more on edge than usually in the days leading up to the game, poring over film of Eliot’s previous wins and running play after play in practice until he’s so exhausted he wants to drop. Except he can’t, because there’s still the pile of homework every time he gets back to his room.

So much for the fun he was hoping to have during his senior year.

On Tuesday night, he meets with Mark, their tutoring sessions having evolved (or devolved, one might say) into talking, sometimes out loud (but quietly, so as to not incur the wrath of the faculty monitor), sometimes in frantically scribbled (in Mark’s case) or carefully written (in Eduardo’s) notes across Eduardo’s blank notebook pages.

Mark’s not a big talker, but Eduardo learns, over those few weeks, about Mark’s family, about the real story behind why he transferred to Kirkland—the rumored version was mostly accurate)—and his plans for The Facebook, for expansion.

Eduardo tells Mark about Brazil, his dad, about football, about his big dreams of the NFL and how scared he is that it _will_ happen. Pretty much the only thing he doesn’t tell him about is Divya (or about how he can’t stop looking at the way Mark chews on his pen in class, or the way his eyelashes shadow his cheeks).

That Tuesday, Mark goes over Eduardo’s Comp Sci homework, finding a few mistakes for Eduardo to fix. Eduardo’s palms are sweaty, and he’s not really sure why. He knows that he’s been enjoying this time with Mark in more than a purely friendly way for a while, but he’s managed to keep himself as cool as possible. Still, what he’s about to ask feels like a big deal, somehow. He doesn’t know why it’s so important to him that Mark be there, but he’s pretty sure this might be the biggest game of his life.

“So,” Eduardo says softly, after the homework is done and stashed in Eduardo’s bag. Mark doesn’t really look up, but Eduardo has learned to look for the signs of Mark’s attention, which he almost always gives to Eduardo. “Are you planning to come to the Eliot game on Friday?”

Then, he’s sure he has Mark’s attention, because Mark has drops his pen onto the page he’s doodling on and is looking up at Eduardo, eyes wide. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No, not the last time I checked.”

“Of course I’m not planning to go. Why would I do that?” Mark turns back around to his paper, resuming his drawing.

Eduardo playfully cuffs Mark on the back of the head, and Mark lets out a quiet squeak. “Because I asked you to, dumbass.”

“Well, thanks for the invite, but I’ll pass.”

“Mark,” Eduardo says, dropping his voice even lower and leaning close, close enough to feel how tense Mark is. “This is a huge game for me. It would mean a lot to me if you would grace us with your presence.”

Mark doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t say anything for long enough that Eduardo is sure that he’s made a huge misstep, said something that tears apart this fragile friendship they’ve been building. But then Mark turns back, and they’re probably _too_ close now, but Eduardo does not even care, especially when Mark says, groaning, “Okay. I’ll go. I’ll hate it, but I’ll go.”

Eduardo claps Mark on the shoulder, letting his fingers, briefly, massage the hard line of muscle there. He smiles and wishes he could take a picture of Mark’s helpless smile back.

*****

12:31 left in the second quarter, and Eduardo already knows he’s not going to be able to walk the next day. They’d watched film to prepare and been told all about the Eliot defense, their ability to rush the passer, but their sheer _size_ is still a shock when Eduardo walks up to the line of scrimmage the first time.

It doesn’t get any better the third or fourth or fifth time. They come out blitzing and pass rushing like mad, and Eduardo can barely stay on his feet—sacked three times, he can’t remember the last time that happened—for the first quarter. He’s hurried at the tail end of the quarter, then tackled as soon as he throws an incomplete pass to Danny. He feels the pain (a twisted ankle, maybe? The angle had been weird on the way down) shoot up his leg as he limps off the field.

Eduardo spends the next two minutes screaming at the offensive line, which has done virtually nothing to protect him for the last fifteen minutes, even though he knows that the match-ups are just a disaster. He needs them to believe that they can do it, or he’s not sure that his back up, a shy freshman named Aaron, won’t be in the game by the end of the first half.

Luckily, the pep talk works, and from then on, the o-line does a much better job of at least allowing Eduardo to stay on his feet, shake off the earlier hits, even though he gets forced out of the pocket way too many times for his liking. Nothing seems to be right—the wide receivers and tight ends aren’t running the routes Eduardo calls for, and the defense is barely hanging on, the Eliot offense racking up an insane amount of yardage.

The crowd, clothed almost exclusively in Kirkland purple, is almost eerily quiet as the team makes its way off the field for half-time. It’s 14-3 Eliot, and Eduardo has to hope that they can somehow pull off a miracle.

When he gets to the locker room, he pushes his hand through his sweat drenched hair, getting it out of his face, planting his feet against the floor and swallowing past the pain in his ankle. Coach Sorkin looks calm, but Eduardo has had three and a half seasons to figure out what’s coming.

“Gentleman, let me be clear. Eliot is a good team—very good. But we are better, and we should be embarrassed about the way that we played the first half of this game. I will _not_ settle for anything less than everyone’s best.” He pauses, and there isn’t a sound in the locker room. “If that’s your best, then we should just pack up and go home now.”

Silence.

“Is that your best?” Coach Sorkin shouts.

Eduardo takes a deep breath, pushing away the aches in his joints, the way his head is throbbing. “No, sir!” he shouts in unison with his teammates.

“Are we going to go out and win this goddamn game?”

“Yes, sir!” they shout, and Eduardo smiles. He can feel the energy building in the room.

Coach Sorkin smiles too, and yells, “Well, let’s get out there and do it, ladies!”

Kirkland receives the kickoff for the second half, and Eduardo marches the team down the field, feeling truly himself for the first time in the game. Feeling the inherent trust you have to have in the guys in front of you, to keep you safe, the faith in the guys behind you to be where you need them to be when the time comes. He gets them all the way down to the 7 yard line, and when, after the snap, he sees the wide open center of Eliot’s defensive line, he makes a run for it and scores Kirkland’s first touchdown of the night himself. Eduardo doesn’t do what he does for the admiration of others, but he does allow himself a moment to let the sound of the home crowd wash over him as he makes his way off the field, his teammates surrounding him.

The defense comes out next, and looks like they’ve been taking some of whatever the Eliot defense was hopped up on at the beginning of the game. The Eliot quarterback looks confused and hesitant, a deadly combination on the field. In the end, it doesn’t even end up being that close. The score is 38-21, and Kirkland goes 5-0 to start the season.

*****

A dodged sack late in the fourth had tweaked his ankle more than before, and he’s wincing and walking slowly back to the locker room, dripping with sweat and feeling the adrenaline course through his veins. He knows from experience that he’ll make it through the next hour or two, high on the win, and then spend most of Saturday with bags of ice strapped to some part of his body, popping Advil.

It’s completely and totally worth it.

The Harvard coach is at the game—Eduardo hadn’t really thought about it while they were on the field, but he’s grateful that they were able to come back the way they did in the second half. Coach Sorkin had helped him arrange a meeting for after Eduardo had a chance to get cleaned up, and Eduardo hopes—god, he wants so much—that this will be the beginning of his college career, football and otherwise.

Eduardo’s the last one to make it to the locker room door, walking slowly to keep from doing any further damage to his ankle, and by the time he gets there, much of the crowd has dispersed. In fact, the only person he sees when he gets there is Mark, in his ubiquitous hoodie and jeans and flip-flops, slouched up against the wall next to the door with his hands shoved deep into his pockets.

He can’t help himself—he’s overwhelmed with joy and cloudy from the pain, and he wants this too much to pretend any more. He smiles at Mark, even though that hurts too and watches as Mark smiles almost helplessly back at him.

“Hey,” he says, crowding perhaps a bit too far inside Mark’s personal space. God, he smells good.

Mark looks down at where Eduardo is keeping the weight off his left ankle, then back up to his face. “They beat the shit out of you out there.”

“Um, thanks?” It’s not like he can argue that particular point.

“I mean,” Mark stammers, and Eduardo tries not to laugh. “You just—I—you were amazing out there. You _are_ amazing, I mean.”

“Thanks,” he says softly, lowering his voice so only Mark can hear. “Thanks for coming.”

“Thanks for making me come.” Mark’s almost whispering, and Eduardo can’t help but move in even closer, looking around quickly to see that no one is watching, and brush his hand through Mark’s hair, at his temple, letting his fingers tangle in the soft strands.

Eduardo knows it’s a risk, but he’s had plenty of evidence to suggest that risk comes with a big upside. He’s wanted this, if he’s honest, since that first week of junior year when Mark walked into that classroom. And Mark proves him right when he takes a handful of Eduardo’s purple jersey in his hand and tugs, hard, pulling them both into the shadowed, dark space between the brick walls of locker room and the concession stand.

They end up pressed tight against each other, Eduardo’s back against the concrete wall, Mark hard and hot in front of him. He can feel Mark’s breath against his mouth and it’s driving him crazy.

“Are you going to kiss me or what?” Eduardo says, challenging, loving the glint in Mark’s eyes before Mark pulls him closer and presses their lips together.

Eduardo lets the wall take his weight as Mark licks against the seam of his lips, until Eduardo lets him in. Mark’s tongue pressing into his mouth, tangling with his own, makes his knees weak (or maybe that was from the hits he took before?) and he winds his arms around Mark’s neck and holds on. The kiss seems to go on forever, hot and heavy but slow, like everything is drenched in honey and will never, ever end. It’s as good as Eduardo had hoped it would be, the times where he’d allowed himself to think about it. Mark’s actually pretty good at this—either through experience or a steep learning curve, but either way, Eduardo’s not complaining, not when Mark’s teeth are closing around his bottom lip.

He’s not sure how long they stay there, but soon enough his ankle is screaming at him and he remembers that he’s got something that he’s supposed to do.

“Shit!” he exclaims, pulling reluctantly away from the kiss. Mark tries to follow him with his mouth, and Eduardo hates to, he really, really does, but he stops him with his hands on Mark’s shoulders. “I have to meet with the Harvard coach in, I don’t know, fuck, what time is it?”

Mark looks dazed as he looks down at his watch. Eduardo can’t take his eyes away from Mark’s red, bitten lips. “Um, 9:30?”

“Shit. Listen, I really, really would love to stay here, but I have to go. This is kind of a big deal and I have to go, like, five minutes ago.”

Mark nods and steps back to give Eduardo some space. Eduardo is suddenly aware of the inability of football pants to cover _anything_ , and he has to close his eyes and take a few deep breaths to calm himself down.

He opens his eyes, and when he looks at Mark, he sees something like doubt, like worry, sweep across Mark’s face. He knows he has to leave, shower, get dressed, and book it to Coach Sorkin’s office in record time, but he also knows that he doesn’t want to fuck this up. So, Eduardo wraps Mark up into a hug, Mark’s body tense and rigid against his.

“This is—this is amazing. I don’t want you to think this isn’t what I want.”

“I’m not a girl, Eduardo,” Mark shoots back, but the way his muscles relax into Eduardo tells a different story.

“I’ll come to your room, after I’m done, okay? Is that okay?”

Mark doesn’t say anything, and Eduardo’s worried that he misstepped somehow, damaged whatever this is, but then he feels Mark nod against his shoulder. “Yeah.”

He squeezes Mark one last time before planting a kiss on the corner of his mouth. “Now I really, really have to go.”

*****

An hour later, he’s crossing the quad, almost jogging (ankle be damned) from the athletic complex to the dorms, holding an envelope in his hand containing his likely letter to Harvard.

Holy shit.

He had showered and dressed in record time, and booked it to get there just as Coach Black was walking through the front door with Coach Sorkin. His brain felt a little jumbled, and the Advil he’d popped back in the locker room hadn’t started to kick in.

They’d sat in Coach Sorkin’s office, him behind his desk, arms crossed over his chest, while Coach Black told Eduardo that they would be happy to have his athletic talent and academic ability on the Harvard campus in the fall.

He wants to call his parents, wants to tell his dad that somehow, he’s managed to achieve the dream that they both had for him. He wants to tell his mom that he thinks this might be it for him, this football thing.

But what he wants more than anything is to get back to Carlson, to find Mark.

Mark answers the door before Eduardo’s managed to even finish the first knock, and all of the trepidation that had built up during his walk across campus, brain no longer clouded, vanishes, because Mark was waiting for him. He is waiting.

“Hey,” Mark says, not opening the door all the way, eyeing Eduardo almost warily.

“Are you going to let me in?” Eduardo says, clutching the letter in his hand, knowing that he can’t even begin to get the huge smile off his face.

Mark shrugs. “I don’t know, are you ever going to stop smiling like that? It’s creeping me out.”

“Mark,” Eduardo says sternly, and watches as Mark unsuccessfully tries to hide his eye roll by ducking his head. “I meant what I said before.”

“That you wanted to come to my room for sex?”

Eduardo swallows hard, because, well, that’s definitely something he hopes is still on the table. But, “Don’t be deliberately obtuse. It’s not a good look on you.”

Even though he can feel the weight of Mark’s glare, Mark opens the door and lets Eduardo in.

“So...” Mark says, fidgeting, which isn’t something Eduardo’s seen him do before. It’s kind of adorable, actually. Mark’s _nervous_.

The room is messy—a laptop open on the desk, another open on the end of Mark’s bed, dirty (or clean, who knows) clothes strewn across the floor. Eduardo can see about twelve empty cans of Red Bull from where he’s standing in the doorway. It feels too hot, almost, even though it’s late October and the weather has been unseasonably cold. He stuffs the letter from Harvard in the back pocket of his jeans, suddenly and completely not thinking about football or college or anything else but the fact that Mark is right _there_ , nervous and quiet, waiting. It only takes a few steps to cross the distance between them, and that’s enough to bring everything from earlier in the night racing right back.

“So,” Eduardo says, wrapping his arms around Mark’s neck, and backing him up toward the bed. “Is this okay?”

Mark nods, swallowing, his breath coming harder and faster against Eduardo’s cheek. He’s surprisingly pliant, allowing Eduardo to move him, press him against the edge of the bed until his knees give out and he sits down, hard.

“Ow,” he grumbles unconvincingly, reaching out to close the laptop that’s still balanced precariously on the end of the bed and setting it on the floor. Eduardo sits down next to him, realizing that his own palms are sweaty. Shit, he’s nervous too, and he doesn’t know why. It’s not like he’s inexperienced or freaked out or anything.

Maybe it’s because he knows somehow that this is a big deal. Mark’s a big deal, and he doesn’t want to fuck it up.

He turns to face Mark and grasps his hand. “Have you—I mean—do—have you ever done this before?”

“Held someone’s hand?”

“I mean, have you ever had sex?”

Mark squirms a bit, like he’s trying to get away, but Eduardo holds onto his hand even tighter, not letting him. “Um, I’ve fooled around before, but just—” He looks up at Eduardo with wide, open eyes that make Eduardo feel a little breathless. “Never with a guy before, and not much with girls, truthfully.”

“Okay.” Eduardo tries to keep his tone non-judgmental, neutral almost. He doesn’t care at all if Mark has slept with every other guy at Kirkland (well, okay, _that’s_ a lie). He just wants this to be perfect, and he wants to know what he’s working with.

“Well, are you going to tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

“Have you? Before?”

Oh. Right. “Yes. Only with one guy, fooled around with others, never all the way with a girl.”

“Oh, okay,” Mark says, sounding a bit disappointed, like maybe he hoped that he might be Eduardo’s first. It’s sweet, actually. Although he’s grateful that someone here will know what they’re doing.

All of the energy, the hot tension in the room that had been there when Eduardo walked in is starting to dissipate, and Eduardo’s dick is letting him know how unhappy it will be if he finds some way to derail this whole thing. His heart doesn’t seem too thrilled with it either, pounding loudly inside his chest. “Listen, I’m glad we got that out of the way,” Eduardo leans into Mark’s space, brushing his nose and lips against the soft skin behind Mark’s ear, breathing him in, feeling him shudder, “but if you’re okay with it, can we move on?”

Mark doesn’t answer, but he figures the hand clasped at the nape of his neck, directing Eduardo toward Mark’s mouth, is answer enough.

This kiss has none of the illicit fear of the one they shared by the locker room, but somehow, there’s more urgency. Maybe because they both seem to be on the same page, they both want to get to the next part. Eduardo brings one hand up around Mark’s back, tugging him in closer, and presses the palm of his other hand to Mark’s chest. They’re twisted around each other awkwardly, still seated, but Eduardo doesn’t want to stop, not ever.

Mark’s the one who gives up first, and pulls away with something that sounds enough like a growl to make Eduardo feel like he’s melting. “Maybe we can try something a bit different?” he says breathlessly, his lips swollen.

“Yeah, okay,” Eduardo says, untangling and kicking off his shoes, before laying down on Mark’s bed, which smells like him, like sheets gone a bit too long between washing and red vines. He smiles at Mark and gestures to him, beckoning.

The weight of Mark’s body on top of his own is fantastic, and Eduardo can’t help but wrap his own legs around the backs of Mark’s thighs.

Mark looks turned on, intent, which is hot as hell. He also looks a little nervous still, which Eduardo can understand, and he won’t say anything—he knows that Mark doesn’t do things he doesn’t want to do.

“That feels good,” he says breathlessly, trying to reassure in a roundabout sort of way. “You feel good.”

“Yeah?” Mark rasps, his voice different than Eduardo’s ever heard it before, and it sends a shiver up his spine. He arches his hips, which in turn makes Mark groan and bury his face in Eduardo’s neck. “I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

Eduardo can’t imagine anything that Mark would want to do that he wouldn’t happily go along with right now, to be honest. “Do whatever you want.”

Mark picks up his upper body and looks at him, and Eduardo doesn’t break eye contact except for the brief second it takes for him to pull his shirt up over his head and toss it among the other clothes on the floor.

“Jesus, seriously?” Mark whispers, his hand shooting out to run his fingertips along the dip of Eduardo’s sternum, down the line of his stomach. “How is that fair?”

Eduardo hums at the touch, feeling a bit embarrassed by the praise, but preening a little too. “Anything else you’d like to see?” he says coyly, and then Mark is there, clasping his hand over Eduardo’s mouth, over his surprised laugh.

“Be quiet, I’m working here,” Mark says, and reaches between them to work open Eduardo’s belt.

*****

It’s messy, uncoordinated, hot, and there’s a part of Eduardo who wants to control it, to show Mark what he knows from the hours he spent with Divya, the few other brief encounters with guys he’s had over the last year. Somehow, though, he can’t make himself do anything, because it feels way too good to stop at all.

Mark’s hands are planted on the bed next to Eduardo’s shoulders, bracing himself, and Mark has his hand wrapped around both of them, their pants open, not off—hell, Mark doesn’t even have his shirt off. It’s driving Eduardo crazy. The rhythm isn’t quite right, and Mark can’t quite fit his hand around their width, but the slide of his cock against Mark’s is maddening. In fact, it’s almost better that it’s not perfect. That fact is keeping him grounded and present, cataloging the harsh panting of Mark’s breath against Eduardo’s face, the way he looks when he pushes forward into the clutch of his fist.

“Is this okay?” Mark grits out, thumb catching on the head of Eduardo’s cock (he’s pretty sure it’s an accident, but _Christ_ , who cares when the world goes white behind his eyelids). His brain helpfully supplies pointers for how Mark could adjust, change his grip, his angle, to make it smooth and perfect.

But all he says is, “ _Yes_ ,” because, after all, this is blowing his mind.

Eduardo wraps his arms around Mark’s back and tugs, making Mark lose his balance and bear his whole weight down on Eduardo. It feels so good, even though Mark stops what he’s doing for a moment.

“Sorry,” he murmurs into Mark’s ear, smiling when he feels Mark slide against him once again, groaning. Mark goes still, for just a moment, then lifts his head to look into Eduardo’s eyes, smiling.

Mark runs his hands down Eduardo’s sides as his hips move, catching the rhythm just right now, and there’s nothing Eduardo could say about it, even if he wanted to. This is perfect. So perfect that he doesn’t even realize he’s so close, doesn’t have a warning before he’s digging his nails into Mark’s back, hard, and crying out, feeling it get wetter and hotter between them. Hearing and _feeling_ Mark’s cries as he picks up the pace and comes, too, messy and slick and amazing.

They’re both shaking, hard. Eduardo can’t remember it ever being like this with Divya—with them, it always felt great. Eduardo never left their encounters anything less than completely satisfied. He hadn’t even realized that you could feel something else until this exact moment. He wants to stay exactly where they are forever, even though they’re both a disastrous mess, and Mark’s starting to get heavy. He wants to stroke Mark’s back, like he’s doing now, until they can both breathe again.

He has no real idea what that means, but he knows it’s different than anything he’s experienced before.

It’s a long time (or at least it feels like it, Eduardo really has no idea) before Mark levers himself up and rolls off, but he stays pressed up against Eduardo’s side.

“Wow,” Mark says, and Eduardo smiles, wraps an arm around Mark’s shoulders and tugs him in closer. They’ll have plenty of time to clean up later (thankfully, Eduardo had the foresight to check in for the night before he came to Mark’s room—if he stays the night he won’t have to worry about getting in trouble. Coach would flip out.)

“Yeah,” Eduardo replies, “definitely.”

There’s a part of him that feels like they should talk now, since they’ve decided to do this and haven’t really dealt with what that means exactly. He doesn’t want to ruin this moment, though, so he keeps his mouth shut. There’ll be time for that later.

*****

In the morning, Eduardo wakes first, even though Mark has his shade pulled down so tightly that there’s no way to know what time it actually is. They’ve shifted in the night—Mark’s now curled up behind him, one arm wrapped around Eduardo’s waist, his hand pressed hot against Eduardo’s stomach and face open-mouthed against the back of Eduardo’s neck.

He doesn’t want to—he just wants to stay exactly where he is for the foreseeable future, actually—but he gently pries himself from Mark’s arms, smiling at the annoyed grunt he gets as Mark settles back down to the bed, curling his hands into the blankets.

Eduardo looks around for a few minutes until he finds a scrap of paper and a pen on Mark’s chaotic desk, and scribbles, _Have to make a call. I’ll come back when I’m done. E._ He puts the paper on the small space next to Mark on the twin-sized bed and reaches over to push Mark’s hair off his forehead.

When he gets back to his room, he pulls his cell phone out of his pocket and dials the familiar number, feeling more nervous than a homecoming game, a meeting with a Harvard coach, and a Comp Sci midterm combined.

His father picks up.

“Hello, Pai.”

“Hello, Eduardo,” his father says, voice even and giving nothing away. As usual.

He takes a deep breath. “Pai, I called to tell you some big news. I’m going to Harvard in the fall. I just found out yesterday—they were impressed with my academic credentials and want me to play on the football team.”

There’s a pause, then, “I see. Well, I suppose that’s something that football has done for you. Congratulations.”

It doesn’t feel like a congratulations should, sharper and harder, but he forces himself to smile so that he doesn’t sound like he heard that. “Thank you.” He’s ashamed by the fact that he can’t stop himself from saying, “I hope you’re proud, Pai.”

The silence is deafening across the line. Eduardo isn’t sure if his father is still there, until he hears a deep breath. “Let’s see how you do once you get there, shall we?”

Eduardo curls his hand around the phone, harder than he intends to. He doesn’t even really mean to say what comes out next, but he can’t help himself. “I’ve always done everything that you asked,” he says slowly, measured, trying not to get emotional and make his father lash out for _that_.

“I suppose you’re right, son, but that doesn’t mean I can’t expect more.”

Eduardo hadn’t wanted to go to boarding school when they were sitting around that table, four years ago, but he knows now that leaving his house—and leaving his father—had been the best decision he’d ever made. It isn’t that his father doesn’t love him; he _knows_ that even though his father does everything to make Eduardo doubt it. It’s that his father thinks that withholding praise and love and affirmation will make Eduardo stronger, tougher, will make him work harder. He believes that’s the best way, and Eduardo can’t say that it hasn’t made him push himself all of these years, even when he didn’t have to or want to.

He knows now, though, that he has to be who he is, to do what is expected up to a point and what he loves after that, and coming to Kirkland has helped to loosen his father’s hold on Eduardo’s life, on _Eduardo_.

“Okay, Pai,” he says, because he’s learned that his father is also who he is, the same way that Eduardo has learned to be, and they have to try to learn to live with that. “Can I speak to Mãe, please?”

“Yes, she’s right here,” his father says, his voice a bit softer, less guarded. “Goodbye, Eduardo.”

As usual, his mother is overjoyed with Eduardo’s news, telling him how proud she is and how exciting that he’ll be playing college football, and it’s enough for Eduardo to say something out loud that he hasn’t said to anyone except Mark, afraid of what it might mean to put it to words outside of their Thursday sessions. “Mãe, players from Harvard sometimes play in the NFL. The Buffalo Bills quarterback went to Harvard.”

“Oh, _querido_ , that’s incredible. You just work hard and I’m sure that if you want that, you can have it.”

It isn’t until she says that that he really believes it’s true. But now that it’s there, between them, it’s heady and exciting and maybe, just maybe, _real_.

*****

Mark’s still curled up, half of his face mashed into his pillow and his palms spread against the sheets, barely moved from the spot Eduardo left him in. It’s seven, and Eduardo needs to try to get an hour in at the gym before his first class.

It’s not really surprising, though, that climbing back in bed with Mark beats out lifting weights.

When Eduardo pushes himself back under the covers, Mark stirs and blinks open one eye. “Hi,” he says, not moving, tentative almost.

“You didn’t even notice I left, did you?” Eduardo waves the note in front of Mark.

“I was tired. Someone kept me up late last night, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.” He smiles helplessly back at Mark, and he can catch the eye roll in the one he can see. “So, I have to tell you something. It’s about my meeting with the Harvard coach yesterday.”

“Okay.”

“I’m in. I’m going to Harvard in the fall.”

Mark pushes himself up quickly, suddenly more awake than he seemed just a second before. “Really?”

Eduardo sits up too, facing Mark. “Yeah, really.” Mark looks down at the wrinkled sheets between them, bottom lip captured between his teeth. It’s not really the reaction he’s hoping for, to be honest.

“Is everything okay?”

Mark looks up. “Yeah, it’s just—I’m applying early action to Harvard. I just sent in my application last week.”

He knows, objectively, that his reaction is stupid. That his heart trying to break its way out of his chest, the way the room feels way too warm all of the sudden, doesn’t make any sense. They’re high school students. Whatever they are doing now should be left where it is.

The trouble is, he doesn’t want that to be the case at all.

“Really? Are you serious?”

“Do I ever say things I don’t mean, Eduardo?” Mark says, exasperated.

“Well, actually, you do, when you’re being an asshole, but that’s beside the point. You want to go to Harvard?”

“It’s the best.” Mark shrugs and crosses his arms over his chest, still wearing the worn t-shirt he’d had on the night before.

“So, we could be going to college together.”

“Ugh,” Mark groans, throwing himself down on the bed and smashing his face into the pillow. “That is such a cliché, I can’t even stand it. Besides, it’s not like we’re dating or anything.”

Wow, that one _hurts_ , an almost physical ache, like a twisted ankle. He thought they were on the same page, that what they’d been doing day after day had just been dating without formally declaring it so. “Oh, okay. I mean, if you don’t want to.”

Mark sits back up. “Don’t be silly. Who wouldn’t want to date you? Gorgeous, smart, nice, football star. Terrible catch, obviously.” He glances down, and when he looks back up, he looks Eduardo right in the eye. “I just assumed that you didn’t mean it like that. I mean, last night was fun, don’t get me wrong, but I just didn’t think you’d want that. With me, that is.”

Eduardo can’t help himself. He practically _jumps_ on Mark, tackling him down onto his back on the bed, straddling his hips. “You know, for someone so smart, you’re really fucking stupid.”

A kiss cuts off whatever Mark is about to say in response. When they pull apart, Eduardo braces himself on one hand, brings the other up to cup Mark’s cheek. “I want this. I can’t—I understand if you want someone who can tell everyone they’re with you, which I _can’t_ , not right now, but I want to be with you.” He smiles and ducks his head, because this is just embarrassing. “I think I’ve wanted that since the first time you cut Mr. Saunders down to size in AP U.S. History.”

Mark turns his face into Eduardo’s hand, and says, “I don’t care if anyone knows. And I’m not stupid. I know better than to turn this down.”

Eduardo can’t understand it—how Mark could possibly think that _he’s_ the lucky one, not Eduardo—but he doesn’t have much time to think about it as Mark sticks his hand under Eduardo’s shirt and slides his fingertips slowly up the line of Eduardo’s spine.

*****

It’s entirely possible that something terrible is about to happen, because everything in Eduardo’s life is going so well that it can’t possibly last. Kirkland makes it all the way to the league championships, Eduardo has a solid A in Comp Sci, and things with Mark...well, that may be the very best thing of all.

If Eduardo’s being honest, which he tries to be as much as possible, at least with himself, he’s been attracted to Mark since the very beginning, since he tried to talk to him that first day. He’s cranky, rude, biting, and the smartest person Eduardo knows. He’s also, at times, unexpectedly sweet, sneaking kisses outside of Eduardo’s door at night when no one is around, bringing Eduardo crazy hard math problems during study hall, and showing up at each of Eduardo’s home playoff games, a navy blue speck in a sea of Kirkland purple.

It may be hard to see if you’re not looking, but Eduardo is looking. And he knows that Mark cares about him, fiercely, through every little thing that he does.

He also hasn’t put any pressure on Eduardo to tell anyone about them. The only other person on campus who knows that Eduardo likes guys is Chris, who’s his neighbor this year and gives Eduardo a look every morning when Mark stays over that lets Eduardo know that they’re not nearly as slick as they think they are. He gets the same look from Dustin, when he creeps out of Mark’s room in the mornings.

For the first time, though, Eduardo wishes it could be different. The way he feels about Mark makes him want to stop in the middle of the quad during the busiest passing time and shout that Mark Zuckerberg is his boyfriend. It’s a stupid thing to think, but it sounds amazing. To be able to really and truly have _everything_ he wants. None of the other guys, not even Divya, have ever been worth it.

He’s one hundred percent sure that Mark is worth it. If he doubts it, all it takes is seeing Mark’s face, the surprise and nearly hidden affection every time he sees Eduardo. It makes it hard to remember why he wouldn’t want everyone to know.

*****

It’s a bone-chillingly cold, rainy New England day when the Kirkland team huddles outside of the athletic center at four a.m. before boarding the bus for the seven hour drive to St. Vincent St. Maria Academy in Virginia. No matter what the outcome, this game will be the last one of their season. The last high school football game of Eduardo’s career. There was a time when Eduardo was certain that this would be the end of his football career completely, but thanks to the likely letter still sitting on his desk back at his room, his career’s getting a much-welcomed extension.

The weather is altogether different when they arrive at the SVSMA campus—it’s still the height of fall this far south, and the leaves that had long since fallen in Massachusetts are still bright red and gold on the trees.

This is the championship game for the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic prep school league, and Kirkland has never in its two hundred year history made it to the game. Eduardo knows—the whole team knows—that SVSMA has been one of the best teams in the country for the past twenty years.

It’s clear as soon as they step on the field, the wind blowing and bringing the temperature down to more of what they’ve been used to back at school, that they are outmatched. The SVSMA defense is fifty percent bigger than the Kirkland offensive line, and Eduardo just tries his best to stay on his feet.

With 0:45 left in the fourth quarter, the score is 24-20 in favor of SVSMA, and Eduardo can’t make much progress up the field on what he knows will be his last drive of the game. They’re on their own 45, and he has a third down and 12.

David, the junior center, flicks a perfect snap, and Eduardo drops back in the pocket. The linemen are doing well, giving Eduardo the time he needs to look downfield, to evaluate all of his options.

Finally, he spots Charles, a sophomore and new addition from the JV team, all the way in the end zone. There’s a cornerback rushing toward him, and Eduardo has to make a split second decision.

He’s not Catholic, and his mother would be appalled to hear it, but he still finds himself whispering under his breath, _Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..._

He hurls the ball, high and arching, over the field. And waits.

The ball’s maybe a bit too high (he mentally runs through the adjustments he could have made to have it be perfect), but Charles is doing a great job of adjusting and keeping his eyes on it. Time slows down and Eduardo keeps his own eyes on trajectory of the ball—he knows when it’s about halfway down the field that Charles is going to catch it.

The question is whether or not the defensive back will make it to the end zone before the ball does.

The rest of the offensive unit is blocking like crazy, but the answer is yes. Charles catches the ball cleanly, and as soon as the ball is in his hands, he’s tackled, hard, to the ground, by the streaking cornerback.

The whole stadium goes quiet, still, until the ball rolls from Charles’ grip onto the ground.

Eduardo’s heart sinks as he hears the riotous cheers from the crowd, as the St. Vincent St. Maria team goes wild on the field. It was a Hail Mary, and a good one, but in the end, it wasn’t enough to win.

The rest of the team walks off the field, heads down. The end to their perfect season isn’t so perfect, but Eduardo’s somehow not as disappointed as he’d expected to be with the outcome. It’s been an amazing season—an amazing year so far in every way—and more than he ever could have expected.

In the locker room, Coach Sorkin gives them a speech about their season, about how they shouldn’t judge the weeks that led up to the game by the outcome. It sounds, in Coach’s own way, like he doesn’t really care, but Eduardo has come to know him in the last few years, and knows that he means every word.

“I know that it’s not by any means traditional to give out a game ball in a losing game, but the hell with tradition, right?” Everyone laughs. “I’d like to give this to a player who just played his final game in Kirkland purple, and one who has had a huge and long-lasting impact on this team and this program. And I don’t know if you’ve all heard, but he’s also heading to Harvard in the fall to play for the Crimson.” He stretches the ball out toward Eduardo.

He’s embarrassed—he’s never been comfortable being a star, and has never asked for that kind of position. He’s come to the field every day in practice and every Friday night to do his job and help his team win. Becoming a starting quarterback had never been his dream. That had never been why he played football. He played for love the game, and for the team.

He takes the ball that Coach Sorkin offers, and smiles at the room, sweat still dripping down his face, his skin still buzzing with adrenaline. “Thanks, Coach. I just wanted to say that it was a great season, and a real privilege to play with each and every one of you. So, thanks, and if any of you end up playing in the Ivy League, I’ll see you on the field.”

There’s applause after that, and Eduardo knows it’s silly, sentimental even, but he stashes the ball in his bag as they’re leaving, for safe keeping.

*****

The ride back from Virginia is quiet, none of the anticipation and bravado that had marked the trip down, and Eduardo sleeps hard through most of it, the trials of the season finally catching up to him. When he arrives back at his room late, tired and weary, his bag slung over his shoulder, he finds Mark asleep in his bed.

“Hey,” he whispers, dropping his bag next to the door and kicking off his shoes. He feels exhausted and wants to shower, but he hasn’t seen Mark in three days, and all he wants is to be there with him, underneath the sheets.

Mark grumbles as Eduardo tucks his cold toes under Mark’s thighs, but he doesn’t move away. Eduardo takes that as a sign that it’s okay to wrap his arms around Mark, to bury his face into Mark’s neck.

“Sorry about the game,” Mark says hoarsely, pressing a gentle kiss into Eduardo’s neck.

“Thanks. I feel okay, actually. Happy.”

Mark pulls away and looks at Eduardo incredulously. “Only you can be happy and positive about losing.”

Eduardo shrugs. “What can I say? I have other things to make me happy.”

“You’re a complete sap. I suppose it’s cute,” Mark says grudgingly, and Eduardo can’t help but pull Mark close again, letting the heat of Mark’s sleep-warm body relax him. “Are you just going to fall asleep?”

“Yes. Sex later.” Eduardo’s eyes are closing of their own accord.

“If you’re lucky,” Mark whispers, and Eduardo can feel it against his ear, all the way down to his toes.

*****

It’s hard not to be popular when you’re the starting quarterback at a school where athletics are king, but Eduardo has never really bought into his own hype. He has a lot of friends in a bunch of different spheres of campus—guys on the team, people he’s met in his classes, Chris, some students he’s lived on the same hall as over the years, people from other clubs he’s a part of. He’s never really been the best friend type, but rather one who seeks out company when he needs or wants it. To be honest, Chris is the only person who knows his most intimate secrets, and that’s partially because they’d lived together for three years and it was impossible for Eduardo to keep things from him.

Eduardo also knows that Mark is in many ways the same. He comes off as socially incompetent at times, but he’s been friends with Dustin since junior year, and he almost always has other people, from the fencing team or math team or just around the dorm, sitting with him at most meals when Eduardo joins them. It’s something they understand about each other; they both want to be around other people sometimes, but they also both have a hard time opening up.

With everyone but each other.

In the end, that’s what makes Eduardo’s decision, in a sort of roundabout way. Taylor, one of the team’s offensive lineman and a day student, decides to host a part at his house when his parents are out of town. This is strictly forbidden by Kirkland; as upper class students, they’re allowed to sign themselves off of campus and they’re allowed to go to the homes of day students, but off-campus parties are off-limits. Still, if they all obey curfew and don’t come back wasted, the school usually looks the other way.

At lunch on Saturday, Eduardo nudges Mark, where they’re sitting probably way too close for plausible deniability. “Want to come with me to Taylor’s party tonight?”

Mark swallows his mouthful of pasta. “What for?”

“Um, well, it’s a party, so...I’m guessing bad beer and substandard music?”

“Wow, that sounds awesome, Eduardo.”

Eduardo places his hand on Mark’s knee, under the table, and squeezes. What he really wants to do is run his fingers up Mark’s inseam, but he’s pretty sure that Mark would object on some level to hand jobs in the dining hall. And besides, he’d rather get Mark spread out on the bed for that. “I’d like you to come, if you would.”

He turns a look on Mark that he knows works almost every single time, and he smiles once he hears Mark’s groan and his, “Fine, ugh, just stop with the face. How is it that you can make me do things I hate when you look like that?”

 _Because you love me_ , Eduardo’s brain so helpfully provides. They haven’t said that yet, not even when they’re naked and sweating and close in the dark, or pressed next to each other on Mark’s bed watching a movie, or during the study hours where they still keep up the pretense of tutoring. They haven’t said it, but Eduardo knows that he feels it, and thinks that Mark does too, if the kind of ridiculous way Mark is staring at him is any indication.

They both sign themselves off-campus around six, and arrive at Taylor’s house when the party is already in full swing, kids spilled out onto the front yard. Eduardo’s not the biggest fan of parties; he likes to have a few drinks, loosen up, and talk to his friends, but that’s about it. This party is actually pretty tame, even though it seems that everyone Eduardo knows is there. Mark has his hands stuffed deep into his pockets, looking at the floor.

“You know, eye contact usually helps with that whole human interaction thing.”

Mark rolls his eyes. “You’re hilarious. I have been to a party, you know. I went to public school.”

A few guys from the team have made their way over to them, clapping Eduardo on the back. This is a celebration of sorts, of their season. “Hey, man,” Billy says, gesturing over at Mark, “how’d you get Zuckerberg to show his face here?”

“Um, I asked him?”

Billy laughs. “I just didn’t really think it was his scene. In fact, what’s the deal with you two? I see you with each other all the time now.”

“We’re friends,” Mark cuts in, arms crossed now and looking annoyed, even for him.

Suddenly, it’s like the bottom drops out of Eduardo’s stomach. He looks at Mark, who’s going along with what Eduardo has asked for, who is perfect in his own way, and who is both Eduardo’s best friend, and _not his friend at all_. He knows that he can just say that Mark’s his tutor, that they’re friends, but it’s that thought that makes everything slot into place, makes the next move easier than he thought it would be. He knows, objectively, that he can make a smarter decision, at least wait to get to Harvard to throw open the door to his personal life, to let anyone who wants to see in. He also knows that this year has been incredible, but football has only been one part of it. The other part has been all Mark.

So, in the end, it’s not that hard to make the decision, to reach out to wrap his fingers around the fabric of Mark’s sweatshirt and tug him close. Mark’s eyes are wide, wider than Eduardo’s ever seen.

“So,” Eduardo murmurs, quiet enough for only Mark to hear. Around them the room has gone quiet, the only sound the music playing in the background, and someone’s turned it down. “If you don’t want me to kiss you, you need to say so right now.”

“What?” Mark says, eyes wide, “What do you mean, Eduardo, of course you can kiss me, you idiot, but—” That’s all Eduardo needs reach forward, take Mark’s face in his hands, and kiss him, in front of nearly every member of their class. He makes it a good one too, doesn’t hold back, tangling his tongue with Mark’s and holding Mark up when his knees seem to give out. When he finally pulls away, he looks around to see shocked faces, Billy Olsen’s mouth hanging open, and some smiles.

“So, Billy,” Eduardo says, still breathless, still holding on to Mark, “does that answer your question?”

“I’d say so,” Billy somehow manages to say with his mouth still hanging open like a fish.

Eduardo waits. He waits for the inevitable other shoe to drop, but instead, he gets Charles, Taylor, and David coming up and standing next to him and Mark. Eduardo knows his face is bright red, burning, he can feel it, but he’s not sorry. It feels like every single victory on the field wrapped up into one.

Billy comes to join them too, after he recovers, and if anyone else has a problem, they don’t say anything after that. In fact, someone turns the music back up, and it’s like Eduardo and Mark’s little sideshow didn’t happen.

“You’re a lunatic, you know that, right?” Mark whispers in his ear, hands wrapped around Eduardo’s waist.

“Yeah,” he replies, leaning down to press a soft kiss to Mark’s cheek.

“It’s a good thing that it’s hot,” Mark says, and then, “how long until we can get out of here?”

It feels good to laugh, like it’s the first time in a long time he’s been able to do it honestly and completely, and he holds out his hand to Mark. “We should at least stay for a little while. What do you say?”

Mark shakes his head before he takes Eduardo’s hand, and they make their way deeper into the crowd.

*****

That night is different, which makes sense after what went down at the party, the fever-bright rush of the revelation. Over the last few weeks, they’ve spent a lot of time together, most of it without clothes on. Mark has proved to be a particularly fast learner, which is not at all surprising.

Still, there are things they haven’t done. Eduardo’s been hesitant to push, even though he _wants_ , god, so much, and Mark hasn’t said anything at all, even though Eduardo talked him through a pretty spectacular blow job the week before, and he hadn’t hesitated then. He doesn’t know why he’s so worried.

They both check in for the night, and at about 11:30, Eduardo creeps down the hallway to Mark’s room, letting himself inside. Mark’s sitting at the desk, typing furiously, and Eduardo is proud that he can now understand about a quarter of what’s flying by on the screen.

“Mark?”

“Hmm?” Mark says absently, not looking up.

Eduardo knows that when Mark gets in the zone, doing some redesign for The Facebook or his music player or some other project he’s working on, it’s hard to pull him away. He’d be annoyed if he didn’t find Mark’s focus insanely attractive.

Besides, he’s learned some methods that are a surefire way to get Mark away from the computer. He pulls his shirt off first, tossing it just a couple of feet from the side of Mark’s chair, then goes to work on his belt, making sure that Mark can hear the way the buckle clangs against itself and the way the leather sounds as it’s pulled out of the loop.

He doesn’t say anything, but he knows he’s won when he feels fingers curl into the waistband of his boxer briefs, hot against the skin at Eduardo’s hip. “Okay, okay, I’ll finish up.” Mark sounds exasperated, but he’s also up from his chair and pushing Eduardo toward the bed.

He’s not exactly sure how it happens—it’s hard to follow everything with Mark’s hand sliding up and down the length of Eduardo’s cock, Mark’s mouth sucking and biting at the juncture of Eduardo’s shoulder and neck—but Mark has lost his clothes too.

Eduardo wraps his legs around Mark’s back, and asks for what he’s wanted for weeks, since well before the first time they were in this same position.

Mark looks up from where his hand is still teasing Eduardo, strokes not quite enough to catch a rhythm or get him anywhere. “Are you sure?”

“God, yes, I’m sure, Mark. Just fuck me.” Eduardo turns, losing Mark’s hand around him, but finding his pants that he’d carefully thrown toward the bed during his earlier striptease. He presses the condom and packet of lube into Mark’s hand. “I trust you.”

“See, that’s the scary part,” Mark says under his breath, but he comes through as he always does, slicking up his fingertips and sliding one back behind Eduardo’s balls, pressing slowly inside.

Eduardo doesn’t really need it to go this slowly, but it feels _delicious_ , the way Mark is being careful and thorough, and Eduardo’s always enjoyed this as much as getting fucked, the way it feels to be opened slowly on someone’s fingers, one by one. Mark has amazing hands, ones that Eduardo has seen flying across a keyboard and wrapped around a foil (as well as around other things), and Eduardo can’t help himself. He lets his legs fall open, wanting to tell Mark, without words, that he can take anything he wants. “Not that this doesn’t feel good,” Eduardo gasps, “but you can move on whenever you’re ready.”

Mark’s not coordinated, and he makes a mess of Eduardo’s stomach as he pulls his fingers out. For a moment, he looks confused, unsure of his next move, and it’s endearing to watch as he nods to himself, resolute, and tears open the condom.

It’s been a while since Eduardo has done this—not since Divya, and they called things off last May—and it feels huge, intense and scary. It’s an addicting feeling, better than any post-game adrenaline rush, one he hasn’t really been able to get out of his mind since the first time he did this. The feeling of taking someone inside of you wasn’t one he’d given much thought to before, but the first time, in that hotel room with Divya, he remembers feeling overcome by it

This is the same in some ways, but completely different, because he never felt about Divya the way he feels about Mark. With Mark, it feels like he’s been cracked open completely, exposed. It’s hard to take, and Eduardo doesn’t ever want it to stop.

Mark’s soft groans wind around Eduardo’s own as he thrusts, long and slow and hard, enough so that Eduardo can feel every inch splitting him apart. He wraps himself completely around Mark’s warm, slick body, his heels hooked around Mark’s thighs and his arms around Mark’s neck.

It doesn’t happen right away, but after a few minutes that are lighting Eduardo up anyway, Mark finds the right angle, the exact right spot, and Eduardo put one of his fists against his mouth, because he’s not sure he can control the sounds he’s making. He can’t think of anything worse than being interrupted at that moment by a faculty member.

Mark’s whispering to him, encouraging, telling him things that Eduardo can’t imagine Mark would say in the light of day, even though he never hesitates to _show_ Eduardo how he feels. Eduardo can’t help the way the words, the promises that Mark makes that are maybe ones he can keep, are making his toes curl.

The friction of Mark’s stomach against his aching cock is enough to get him close to the edge, especially with the way that Mark is sliding mercilessly against his prostate. “Mark, just—” he whimpers, not too proud to beg, because he needs to come as soon as humanely possible, yesterday if that can be arranged.

“What?” Mark scratches out, voice gone sex-heavy and hoarse.

“I don’t know, I just—you’re making me _crazy_ ,” he pleads.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Mark replies, voice faltering halfway through when Eduardo clenches around Mark inside of him, trying to move him along.

Eduardo pulls Mark closer. “Come on, fuck me,” he says softly, locking eyes with Mark’s, which are shockingly blue, even in the dim light coming in from outside the dorm.

That gets a hard thrust which Eduardo can feel tingling along his arms where they’re wrapped around Mark, and everything goes from slow and languid to fast and purposeful in an instant.

Eduardo knows he’s probably too loud, can hear the noises coming from his mouth but can’t stop them, his body stretched taut and tight like the string on a violin. When he comes, it’s like a cymbal crash, loud and sharp and ringing in his ears.

Mark’s still moving inside of him, and it’s almost too much, too sensitive as Eduardo breathes heavily, shakes, and tries to come down, but he doesn’t want it to stop, preferably ever. And when Mark comes, Eduardo holds onto him, pressing their mouths together and swallowing Mark’s shallow, desperate cries.

Later, when they’re lying next to each other, Eduardo wearing Mark’s boxers since they were the first thing he swiped off the floor, Eduardo hears “I love you,” from above his head, where Mark is curled around him, so softly he almost feels it more than he hears it.

Everything goes still in that moment. He wants to say it too—he’s been wanting to for a few weeks now, knowing for sure that the way his insides seemed to melt every time he got within ten feet of Mark must mean something like love. He wants to say it and he wants Mark to really hear it, to believe that Eduardo’s vision of his future is rapidly expanding by the minute, every minute he spends with Mark.

So, he makes the decision, rolling over to straddle Mark’s hips. Mark looks startled, like he hadn’t expected Eduardo to hear him at all, and that somehow makes it even more important for him to say it now.

“I love you too,” he says clearly, eyes searching Mark’s face. Mark’s not giving away much of anything, except a small smile that tells Eduardo everything he needs to know.

Maybe, just maybe, this is the beginning of something that Eduardo hadn’t even known he could have. He’d always been scared of this, somehow, protecting himself from whatever impact it could have on his eventual goals. There’s a part of him that knows that while football is something he loves, he won’t get to have it forever. It may make him the world’s silliest, most hopeless romantic, but he’s starting to think that maybe _Mark_ is something he can try to have for even longer.

*****

The Harvard campus shows off in October—even though Eduardo’s more than used to the New England fall colors by now, it still doesn’t fail to impress him as he makes his way across the quad.

Eduardo thought he knew what he was getting into, playing Division I football, but it’s more than he ever could have expected it to be. He’s not even starting yet, except on special teams sometimes (he’ll spend another year behind Cameron Winklevoss, so he just practices hard and stays fit and waits), but the practices are brutal, long, and the work outside of practice is so much more challenging.

He loves it.

He loves the classes he’s taking, which are full of incredible minds and push him to think in completely different ways. It’s demanding and he’s not sleeping as much as he used to (which wasn’t much at all to begin with), but he doesn’t really care.

In October, the team will travel to New Haven for the annual Harvard-Yale game. Eduardo is still having a hard time believing it will actually happen, but his parents are planning to be there for the game. His father had called a few weeks before, telling Eduardo that he had business in New York that week and they thought they might like to come. It still hasn’t sunken in yet. Mark’s planning to be there, too, even though he’s complained about it, and Eduardo’s still trying to figure out if this might be the right time to tell them.

Eduardo and Mark aren’t living together—they’re probably not ready and they both know it isn’t the wisest choice—but they did ask to be in the same house, and ended up three doors away from each other. Eduardo’s over there a lot, and Mark’s roommate, Kevin, grins when he answers the door, making Eduardo smile sheepishly, and calls back into the room that Mark’s boyfriend is here, making Mark roll his eyes.

The guys on the team know about Eduardo, about Mark, and almost everyone has been amazingly cool about it, inviting them both when the team gets together off the field, no different that if Mark was Eduardo’s girlfriend. He gets a few sidelong glances in the locker room, but he’s learning that what he gets in return for that—Mark at home games, at the end of the day after a midterm, soft and unguarded in sleep—is absolutely and completely worth it.

There’s at least one moment every day where he’s positive this is all going to disappear, go up in smoke. Football, Harvard, and most importantly, Mark—it seems like more than he can possibly deserve, way too good to be true. So he holds onto it tightly, the way Mark’s face goes soft when Eduardo walks into his dorm room and pulls him away from frantic Facebook coding (Mark has been working with Dustin, who’s at MIT, to expand to colleges, and it’s moving fast, so fast) to get dinner, the way Mark’s eyes go dark when they finally have a room to themselves, and the way that Mark is always there on the sidelines, during every game, wearing a red Harvard hoodie.

*****

 

**New England Patriots select openly gay QB Eduardo Saverin in the third round of NFL draft**  
 _April 29, 2016  
Harvard Crimson  
Jamie Calderon, Staff Writer_

In the 2016 NFL draft, Harvard saw its highest draft pick in years. With the 73rd pick, the defending Super Bowl champions, and the winners of two of the last four championships, selected Ivy League star QB Eduardo Saverin, who is coming off a sensational season, leading Harvard to 10-0 to take the Ivy League for the third year in a row. The Patriots are looking to groom a new quarterback under Tom Brady, who won the league MVP last season for the fourth time and doesn’t seem to be slowing up much at almost 39. Still, Saverin fits very well into the team’s system and Coach Bill Belichick had nothing but praise for him. “Eduardo is an impact player, and despite coming out of a smaller program, we have every reason to believe that he can make his mark on the field in Foxborough. He’s smart, tough, and a team player. He has great potential.” Saverin, who will graduate in May, on track for _summa cum laude_ with highest honors in Economics, is originally from Brazil and Miami, and became a quarterback for the first time partway through his freshman season at Kirkland Academy in western Massachusetts.

He’s also, notably, the first openly gay college player selected in the NFL draft. While there are now a small number of openly gay professional athletes, the stigma still keeps athletes from coming out before they’re drafted. When Belichick was asked about Saverin’s sexuality, he said, “It doesn’t matter. Eduardo’s coming to the Patriots to play football. I will personally make sure that he’s able to do that, every day.”

Saverin didn’t seem fazed by the question when asked. “I love football, and I’m overjoyed about this opportunity to play for a great team, but ultimately, I need to be who I am. If that meant the NFL didn’t want me, I would do something else with my life. I’m happy to show others that they can be themselves and be in this league, too.”

Saverin has been dating fellow Harvard College senior Mark Zuckerberg since their senior year at Kirkland. Zuckerberg is creator and CEO of Facebook (which he built back in his Kirkland dorm room and made into the 800 million member social network it is today — Saverin provided some of the capital used to expand beyond prep schools during their senior year there). When asked how Mark felt about him being drafted by the Patriots, Saverin laughed. “Mark likes football more than he’d ever admit, but ultimately, I think he just wants me to be happy. I’m just glad that he agreed to keep the company in Boston — I know he was hoping I’d be drafted by Oakland or San Francisco he could be in Silicon Valley. He told me that it could have been much worse, like Indianapolis or Jacksonville, so I think everything will be okay.”

The Crimson would like, on behalf of the Harvard community, to wish Eduardo the best of luck with his NFL career.


End file.
